$15M more for Ed Dept. system fix
THE MAYOR’S race just got louder.
Former NYPD detective Bo Dietl launched his independent bid on the steps of City Hall Tuesday, attacking Mayor de Blasio for everything from his fund-raising (“He’s a corrupt person”) to his oversight of the homeless and the Administration for Children’s Services (“No one cares about these kids”) to his penchant for latemorning workouts (“this lazy guy”) and his height (“Big Bird de Blasio”) in a press conference delivered almost entirely in a nearyell.
“My point is, he’s a corrupt person and he has to be taken to task,” Dietl said. “And I’m not afraid of him. He may be 6-foot-8, (but) Bo Dietl’s not afaid of him.”
(De Blasio is just under 6 feet-6, actually.)
Dietl, who served as a detective for 15 years and went on to run a security consulting firm and become a cable news personality, said he has the solutions to the city’s problems. For ACS, he suggested that the officers of the NYPD would be happy to help keep up with the caseload of children reported to be neglected or abused, and said retired cops could also pitch in if given waivers to work as ACS caseworkers. On the homeless, he first said the city needed permanent homes for people, then argued that the city could build temporary shelters on cityowned land.
On the budget, he — like the most prominent Republican candidate, Paul Massey — said he’d work better with President Trump.
“You can’t stick your finger up at the President of the United States, whether you like Donald Trump or not. The Brooklyn Bridge is falling. We need affordable housing for our city,” he said.
Dietl is running on his own party line, NYC Cares. He tried to register as a Democrat but couldn’t because of a paperwork error he deemed “mysterious.” He said he’d evolved from a Republican to a moderate, conservative Democrat and deemed Massey a “nice guy” who lacked “the horsepower to take on Big Bird.”
“I call him like Melba toast. You know what Melba toast is?” Dietl asked, pausing. “He doesn’t have the horses.”
A Massey spokeswoman responded: “Given Paul built a business from the ground up in New York City, and we’ve set two fund-raising records in a row, we THE CITY is pumping millions more dollars into a computer system blamed for bungling the educational requirements of special needs kids.
The Department of Education is set to spend another $14.8 million next year in an effort to fix the Special Education Student Information System — better known as SESIS — on top of $12.4 million in this year’s budget.
Critics say the system, which is supposed to track the special needs of more than 190,000 students with disabilities, has deprived kids of needed services while costing the city millions.
Schools officials said Tuesday fixing the existing system was the best approach — in part to avoid losing data stored in the system — but could not say when the upgrades would be ready.
“It needs some serious improvements,” said schools Chief Operating Officer Ursulina Ramirez.